


Affrettando

by psalloacappella



Series: Equilibrium [15]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Belligerent Sexual Tension, Complicated Relationships, Conspiracy, Drama, F/M, Gen, Shinobi Politics (Naruto), Team as Family, Trauma, Uchiha Sasuke Has Issues, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-17
Updated: 2019-11-17
Packaged: 2021-02-07 15:07:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21460042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/psalloacappella/pseuds/psalloacappella
Summary: If it’s half of what he feels, a touch could erupt them in an instant, a lit match to a tinderbox. She stays silent. Her movements reflect the dance, and he wonders if she thinks a detail ever escapes his gaze.Arms unfolded now, his fingers signal something universal.“Come.”(Perhaps this is what you’ve been terrified of—how she breathes life into you, and holds you up to the light.)❦They teeter together on the edge of a decision. Sakura aims to draw out the enemy. Naruto moves in.
Relationships: Haruno Sakura & Uchiha Sasuke & Uzumaki Naruto, Haruno Sakura/Uchiha Sasuke
Series: Equilibrium [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/46843
Comments: 4
Kudos: 120





	Affrettando

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you pisco sours

He gasps.

Like breaking the water’s surface, a pitchy, desperate sound slices through the room. It’s laden with sleep, warm, before he shatters the silence, ripped from a nightmare and ruining the calm as he’s slammed into reality, into consciousness.

Sits up straight in the dark, rising from the dead. Staring into the blankness. He’s no stranger to terrors, and the ones afflicting him after his stint in prison are no kinder or softer than the ones endured on the road, on hard beds and benches in underground tombs, or hallucinated somewhere in the delicate limbo losing too much blood, the infinitesimal moments of wishing a breath was his last. It’s not something he speaks to, not finding it polite conversation. Chest feels tight; limbs vibrating with adrenaline not yet faded, he clutches himself, fingers splayed across the bones that cage his frantic pulse.

There’s still a while to go before the break of dawn.

“Hmm.”

A murmur with a questioning tone floats up from the woman next to him, and he knows next will come her wild hand, thrashing about to find him like he’s lost, like he’s left without letting her know. Which, to be fair, he’s done. Their instincts are tender, but sanctimonious: Always wanting to keep eyes and hands on one another while failing to communicate just what they’re so terrified of if they lose grip.

Swallowing hard, he roughly brings a hand across his face to wipe away beads of sweat, and feeling them beneath his palms causes mounting, misdirected anger. Taking her wrist, he places her arm across her torso and tucks her tighter into the sheets. Her nose wrinkles, and she shuffles, still deep in sleep, jerking her shoulder a little to let the blanket loose. Sighs. He’s observed she also has something that tosses and turns her at night, but he isn’t privy to what. Asking his teammates yields no results. He has suspicions, dark ones, seething fantasies of her done wrong that make him feel like ruining the nearest stranger. In her younger days, it might have taken a glare to undo her. Now, she locks some things up a little too tight for his taste, painting a glossy sheen over something bruised.

The day he finds out, he’s not sure what he’ll do.

Footsteps shuffling like whispers, he heads for the stairs.

The wooden stairs groan, moan, a jaded morning song. He closes his eyes tight. Heart rate free falling again, settling into its usual hum. A yawn catches in his throat, tight in his jaw and ears, which he stifles as he walks into the kitchen, intent on tea.

He finds himself up early like this, wandering around in a home that isn’t his but one that’s been opened to him. Comfortable in intuition, navigating in space so obviously hers, learning in no time at all where items are kept and stored and hidden, what they divulge about the owner. A haphazard collection of debatably edible ingredients, reflecting her well-meaning attempts at a regular cooking habit. Books, of medicine and history and botany. First aid items, instruments and tools with which to take care of others. Spare keys (at Kakashi’s mention, she’s removed them from the front porch); indicators of visitors, notes from people with mundane references to things unseen or missed by him (Wear this when we’re out next week! –Ino), (Thanks for sewing it back up! –Naruto), (See you again some time? –Ryo). It takes an inordinate, savage grasp of control to refrain from burning that last stupid, vapid note into cinders. Then feeling pathetic and warped for even caring that much. Still, all the things he needs are always here, in the same places for him to find, some semblance of belonging.

Standing in the dark, sipping the tea despite its scalding heat, he tries to remember the first time he stayed overnight and comes up empty. Not sure if its callous of him or simple delirium, as his first few days out of prison are disconcertingly fuzzy, difficult to pin down. Knowing he never had to ask, she never had to offer. Bound and intertwined by a simple law of the universe. Liquid burns his esophagus all the way down as he drinks it defiantly; as if she’s in the room watching him, egging him on to fulfill a dare. He ruminates on her baffling, evasive behavior. He knows he’s the furthest man from perhaps emotionally stable and romantic, but _goddamn _he will not take another _no._

He’s asked several different ways. Multiple times. Whispers, weak groans, and demands, particularly in those devastatingly suggestive moments when he’s inside of her, and she’s wrapped around him so tightly there’s no telling where one of them ends and the other begins. She continues to evade and fuck him up with her smiles. Says she has to think about it, that she will let him know. Parries his questions. He offers, she obliges, they’re sated. Behaviors at odds with what they’re doing, this silky, twisted dance of a bond that’s hijacking him, making him feel insane in a new way.

Angrily draining the dregs, he sets the mug down with a sharp _clack_, and heads back up the stairs, which sing the mournful morning song again.

Every time he leaves, she unconsciously migrates into the space he’s left, claiming it as her own. On her back now, arm blithely across her stomach, eyebrows furrowing in the middle as he’s seen her do when she reads, lost in concentration, reaching into books for answers. Odd, specific things, like the growth patterns of a particular, scarce herb or the effectiveness of a procedure used in a remote village, a place of which he’s never heard or seen on a map. If he’s honest with himself, it’s no wonder she keeps saying no to him and his stupid boyfriend question; he’s never once thought she’s looked angelic or docile in her sleep. He wonders if those are things people just _say_, simpering comments after someone’s love has clouded them wholly. Still, there’s something –the careless, defenseless way she sleeps; her long, slender fingers slightly curled on her stomach; the purple diamond that seem to give off its own energy, sparkle, even in the dim- that draws him to her even in this state.

All these little, fractured emotions he’s experiencing around her are coalescing in an insatiable mosaic. A little more difficult to bend her like he expects, the way he left her, and it’s certainly not unattractive. The resistance, the presence she carries, touches some abyssal and aristocratic core he’s always embodied, woven into the crest he’s always carried, no one else ever quite meeting his personal measure. Elemental grace. Why is this so difficult? More to the point, what is she wanting from him first?

He’s not sure, but as he gives in to baser instincts, imprudent, knees on the bed and his lips on the pliable, soft skin of her stomach, his concern about it ebbs away. Does it matter too much what they’re considered? The lack of definition sometimes feels like impotence, though more often, lately, it feels like nothing that deserves energy. When she’s in front of him, whatever she’s asking for goes. Leans the bridge of nose into her and her skin dips, gives when he presses on it, malleable. So different than his own.

She makes a quiet noise, a soft sound, again like a question. Eyelids flutter, and the nose wrinkle again.

But he’s such a weak man, and a self-destructive one. Places his hand flat, fingers splayed, breath catching at how he can nearly palm her entire, tiny torso. Pads of his fingers tapping on the ribs he can reach, playing out the song he can always hear when he’s close to her, the hum of everything existing on the right wavelength. It’s addictive and sends his mind spinning, throws caution to the wind as he dips his head and his lips are on her again, trailing along her stomach, careening here and there with no path because it would be all right if it never, ever stopped. He will drink her, devour her, consume her, and will let her do the same to him if she so much as twitches her little finger. Skin on fire, his heartbeat climbing again in anticipation. His mouth drags over a raised something, skin previously torn open and stitched up neatly, the bump of a scar.

What tumbles out of him is a pant, the catch of air in the throat, the sounds he tries to stifle when she’s working him in the way she likes, in control and irises green and sharp and never once letting him get off easy. He watches her, waiting for her eyes to open.

There it is again – that throaty hum. A muscle in her thigh trembles beneath him; eyelashes flutter, revealing the barest slit of green before falling closed again. Everything collides and immediately blurs, slurring, legato notes when he hears these sounds from her. Walks his fingers on each of her individual ribs, inhaling deeply, errant thoughts wandering in and out of the back door of his mind, like why she never smells terrible even when elbow-deep in a dying corpse and how she manages to sleep through this even for a moment.

And if anyone has given her even a goddamned fraction of the pleasure he has.

His hand cups her breast and a throaty moan escapes her lips, dripping in the quiet. A wavering note, it tapers off in a whisper at the end. “Sasuke . . . kun.”

He’s done plenty of stupid and dangerous things, and here’s one more he can tally on if he lives. But with his name falling from her lips, husky and thick, those concerns seem inconsequential. Teasing trained shinobi from sleep is a perilous precipice to aim for, and he decides, dragging a calloused thumb over her nipple, and _there it is, _electricity crackling just beneath his skin, every hair on end, bumps rising on her limbs twisted in sleep beneath him – it’s absolutely worth the risk.

Pinches it, feeling it harden beneath his touch, the whispered _oh!_ that tumbles out in a murmur, still in that strained, sandpaper voice that wraps itself around his name like a vice. Like he swallows it, the sound swirls in his stomach and settles lower, much lower than that. Obsession is terrifying, horror in the journey and clutching at the close. Pulls back a little, drops a kiss on the protruding bone of her hip and is rewarded, duly, with her shudder and jerk, and now unintelligible words whisper and dissipate into nothingness. Meaningless in the backdrop.

He starts it again; the languid journey of his lips traveling from her stomach, to each rib, each one receiving time as she floats to the surface, still caught in deep sleep. Breaths hitching. Sliding a knee between her legs, his mouth lands on her other nipple, teasing her with a practiced tongue on his way to the exposed, snowy skin of her neck.

He looms over her, hand cradling her face and thumb on her cheek, leaning in closer and pressing harder to elicit another breathy moan because damn it, he lives on those, and for his effort he receives a gorgeous, intimate second.

A fraction of a moment in time, in which her eyes are open, endearingly unfocused, pink hair splayed across the pillows; lips parted with the tip of his name on her tongue and the bewildering, provocative space in time in which she emerges from the unconscious, reality clicking in as he watches. Intoxicating in its vulnerability.

The afterimage still lingers in his mind as her forehead comes up swiftly and with a sickening—

_crack!_—

—crushes the bones in his nose.

He’s in her lap, bent over, hand covering his face. The anticipated anger doesn’t materialize, instead he just sort of _whines._

“Oh god, Sasuke-kun, I was—what happened, I—I was dreaming and you, you scared me!” Her words come out in panicky, staccato justifications, flustered and confused. The delightful red in her cheeks from moments before is subsumed by pure embarrassment as she feels the coiling heat in her lower stomach, acutely aware of her peaked nipples and streaked with red, tumescent leftovers of hard kisses. As it all comes together, and she tries to shake her head to clear away cottony sleep, she looks down to see bright red droplets spattered across her collarbones and breasts.

“Look at me,” she says, putting a hand under his jaw to direct him; he jerks away with a shuddering inhale.

“So you can get another one in?” he asks, voice thick and sarcastic.

“It was an _accident_.” Continues to tug and try to catch his gaze.

“Sath-kura—”

“You’re kind of a shit patient.” She finally pulls his face up to meet hers. Winces. Pushing his hair off his forehead, she sees the bruises around the eyes starting to settle in, deep and dark. Also, his nose usually doesn’t look quite like this, the handsome bridge interrupted by shifted bones. She grimaces. “Come here, Sasuke-kun.”

One hand rubs his back in small circles while the other gingerly touches his face here and there. She’s not the most adept at hiding her expressions, with him at least, and his heartbeat isn’t abating one bit as she tilts him this way and that, sucking in air through her teeth. Despite the pain, everything’s singing, and he calculates the pain and payoff of taking her back to the mattress.

These are death wishes and he stifles the thought of his best friend laughing in his stupid, desperate face.

“I’m in disbelief, Uchiha Sasuke.”

“Hmm?”

“That you can maintain an erection through this pain.” Her clinical words have an air of sarcasm, _she’s fucking teasing me._ Placing a delicate hand on the back of his head, lithe fingers against his scalp, the corner of her mouth turns up in a self-satisfied smirk. Her thin fingers grasp his nose, the touch singeing his skin and introducing another heady wave of pain. “Think of something pleasant.”

A green glow begins to thread itself around her hand and against his face. The pads of her fingers push and massage here and there, though despite hearing his own bones crick and crack and crunch into place, his heavy-lidded gaze falls on her collarbones, at the hollow of her neck, sweat beading through her porcelain skin, emerging through a sieve. A particularly satisfying _crunch_ halts his racing, lascivious train of thought for a few seconds. She frowns a bit, trying to concentrate.

“You need therapy.”

“Me.” He’s almost pouting, his tone accusing, and she responds in defiant sputters.

“L-listen! I was asleep. It was an accident. I was dreaming and you frightened me. Who sneaks up on sleeping, trained shinobi, anyway?”

To be fair, that exact thought had crossed his mind earlier, but he’ll die before he admits it. As she jerks his nose a little to the left, he wonders if she’ll be able to mold it like it was before. As if she hears his thoughts, she presses herself against him and brings her lips close to his ear. “You’ll still be offensively handsome,” she whispers, and he can hear the hint of a laugh at the close. Everything buzzes when she’s this close, an electric current. Delighting in his torment.

He murmurs something indistinct. Removing her fingers from his nose, the green glow fades. Sakura should ignore it, but: “What did you say?”

His tone is sardonic. “Four. You’ve broken four of my bones. All on accident, _apparently_.”

“If it makes you feel better,” she sighs, patting him on the cheek and standing up, “That’s on the low end. Ask Naruto about his count. Hell, ask Sai.”

She raises her arms above her head and stretches, while he raises a tentative hand to his face. He frowns at the blood still flecked on him and her, the slight twinge still sensitive in the bridge of his nose. Scooping clothes off of the floor, she heads toward the shower.

He’s starting to get the impression she’s playing with him, dangling him like a scrabbling mouse, and she, a lofty cat. Her wit is annoying. Her confidence is annoying. Or perhaps it’s only annoying when he feels like he isn’t teasing back, and he’s certainly not winning. Though in some way, she’s also hiding tiny parts of herself, tucked in and unavailable, in the way he’s done his entire life to anyone who dares attempt to crawl inside. When it’s not him, it’s frustrating.

When he’s sitting in the kitchen, on his second mug of tea, and she comes down the stairs with those long, bare legs, yanking a tank top over her head, he knows she’s throwing caution to the wind. To him. Seeing what he’ll do with it. He watches the fabric drag, smoothly traversing down and over her breasts, ribs, and has the insane, hysterical urge to say _fuck you, fuck this!, _scream in frustration, carry her upstairs, or burn something to the ground, and maybe he’s actually starting to fracture, go insane, because this is outrageous. This isn’t on purpose. Maybe.

But when she stares at him, hard, high spots of red sitting in her cheekbones, he’s not sure at all.

Maybe, this is what it’s like to deal with him. He scoffs internally, crushes the thought.

She crosses the wood floor, into the kitchen. Before she can reach for anything, he taps on the kitchen table to grab her attention. Sakura twists at the waist, and he nods to the steaming mug across from him, already flavored with sugar, because she likes some of her snacks and drinks stupidly, infuriatingly sweet. Not unlike this patchwork personality she doles out to him in little grains, with hard pieces that cloy together within that he can’t melt. A soft smile settles on her face, and she takes the seat across from him, tucking hair behind her ears. A contented noise floats into the silence as she sips from the mug, and despite himself, he languishes in it, like a plush cushion.

“Your poor eyes,” she murmurs. “Those will take a while to heal.”

And as she locks him with her stare again, eyes dancing, the air floods with heat. Bare feet touching his under the table and he hardly remembers when or how because all he can wonder is if this is what she wants, him caught in a strained web, and the tips of his ears are on fire and it’s reaching down his neck and chest, burning. Some perplexing wreath of anger and desire holding him hostage, but he forces the harsh words from his mouth.

“What is this?”

Sakura doesn’t answer. Blinks once at him.

“What are we?”

Nothing.

“What do you want from me, Sakura?”

“I thought you were supposed to be intelligent!”

Sasuke almost sputters indignantly, but it would be so unbecoming he might actually have to take his own life. Instead he curls his hand around the tea mug, wanting to crush it to pieces, and then bring the rest of the table along with it.

“I know you, Sasuke-kun. And I know how you chase things. How you feel things are your responsibility, your purpose. Something else will come along and you’ll feel that it’s your ridiculous, noble cause to undertake on your own. You’ll slip away, selfish and single-minded. Eventually, you’ll break out of the cage. Even if it leads you to ruin. Even if it shatters all the things you’re trying to rebuild.”

The silence rings, a furious buzzing in his ears. Every word of hers is so devastating and on the nose; her eyes are brimming, threatening tears. Something tells him not to break her gaze, to stare back, that if he does he’s nothing less than weak and he’ll be all the things she fears of him. He folds his arms, feels his chin jutting out and spine straightening, tapping into the insults he knows, that have always been at his back: Regal, arrogant, lofty, rude.

“I’ve asked, and not received an answer.”

“Of course I want to be with you, you absolute idiot!”

There’s nothing quite like being called an idiot by Sakura. When it’s directed at Naruto, it’s hilarious, deserved. Having it slapped across his face makes his head spin with anger and shame. It makes him want to shake her, shatter the veneer of being normal and mentally stable in one fell swoop.

“But leave it to you to not understand.”

“Explain.”

“What?”

“Like you said to me,” he says, voice coming out a bit meaner than intended, “tell me what I don’t understand.”

He expects resistance or coy, skewed glances, not the trembling of her lower lip. As she covers her face with her hands, she digs into her skin with angry fingertips as if to test if it will give, a piece of fruit.

“They’re following me, Sasuke-kun. All of us. I can’t ignore it, I always think about it. The people that fought alongside us on teams, as shinobi, are being recruited by something shadowy, something we can’t see. We’re losing their trust. Naruto, you, and I, we’re stuck now. I’ll never be able to go back to being a nobody. There are things . . . I haven’t told you.”

She breaks off, closing her eyes tight, choking unspoken horrors back down her throat. He wants to kiss her and shake loose all of the details he’s missed.

“I’m scared.” She swallows. “And I have been a mess. But do you know what the worst part of it is?”

“You know,” he says, slowly, each syllable a declaration, “no one will get near you.” _Not with me here. _

She laughs; it’s eerie, caustic, infuriating, makes his hair stand on end. Unsettling, the way a flush starts up again on her chest and cheeks, flushing her to the tips of her ears. Something makes sense in his body before it comes together in his mind, and she confirms it by the soft, sweet tone that he’s heard for years, the one she only presents to him. What’s always stuck with him, whispering in the tunnels in his mind, what’s lingered in the wake of his nightmares and quiet, isolated days.

“Deep down, that all doesn’t matter. Because I’m selfish, and I want you anyway.”

It’s in these moments he feels pressed to speak, something romantic and comforting and perfect, a line of poetry amid swooning dialogue. But he doesn’t think that expressing or articulating exactly what’s in the air between them is an option, either; they’ve never truly needed all of that. They can’t, not yet.

“Come here.”

She blinks. “What?”

“Come here.”

Neither moves. He watches her small chest cavity expand and shrink, the motions of an instrument, strained at the fill and flexing and folding on the exhale. Her lips part, tongue running over them parched and dry, the whisper of a tremble in her body, like the last wavering leaf on a picked, wintry branch. One of her arms falls from the table into her lap, and Sasuke knows she’s searing, scorching. If it’s half of what he feels, a touch could erupt them in an instant, a lit match to a tinderbox.

She stays silent. Her movements reflect the dance, and he wonders if she thinks a detail ever escapes his gaze.

Arms unfolded now, his fingers signal something universal.

“Come.”

Jerkily, chest popping and leading, she walks around the table to stand in front him. Like he’s pulling her in on chakra strings, twitching her here and there, just the faintest bit of resistance. Gazing down on him with a curious, tantalizing glint of defiance and blatant thirst. A shuddering breath escapes, and she hates herself for the saliva flooding her mouth, the hungry vividness in his charcoal eyes, always with the glimpse of red. Her lips feel swollen, stupid, and he hasn’t even kissed her yet, but the promise is there.

“Y-yes.”

“Yes what?” A sharp inquiry, commanding. Bumps scatter across her skin, up into her scalp and down to her feet as she stands on the cold, hard wood. Rich voice delving into her core, into her soft being and soul, coating every microscopic inch of her existence.

Swallowing, she licks her lips. She loves and hates his graceful, handsome body draped just so in her chair, at her table, realizing she’s flipped his switch after all her digging, and clawing control back from him will be more difficult, but no less rewarding.

She manages to speak, an order strident and confounding and divine.

“Ask me again.”

A second. Another. She feels her backs of her thighs hit the table, hard, and in the next instant her limbs are around him, clinging, arms on his shoulders and legs around his hips; she gets a fraction of a second to inhale before his mouth is on hers, crushing and hot, and every part of her is melting, tangling. She deepens the kiss, nails springing into his back to hold on tighter, mold herself to him. There’s no one else who quite gives her this, devotes so much attention to her like this. He repositions her hips, smirking into his next kiss, her raspy _oh! _of surprise humming in his ears. Without warning, her fingers tangle in his hair, hang on tight as she rolls her hips into his, agonizing and punishing, like she’s paying him back. A ragged sound comes from him, an animal tearing it from his throat with its teeth.

She tries to speak, but he’s stolen all her air. Her lithe arm snakes between their bodies, fingers dancing on his hem. He hates the sounds he makes, as she’s not even truly touching him yet, and he’s always in pieces when they’re done.

And as her fingers wrap around him, her teeth split the skin on his neck. Biting. Stinging in the open air. A heady, dizzying wave of pleasure swipes at him; it always hits him hard and fast, some invasive inoculation. Heartbeat careening out of control not unlike every time he’s been close to Death. Whether a race or a waltz, he’s drawn to its abstract chill as long as he can fight with beautiful heat.

Whispers tumble on his chest as she kisses him, cradles him, maneuvers him, words melting into blurry, melodic tones.

He’s so senseless, he’ll agree to anything.

_(Perhaps this is what you’ve been terrified of—how she breathes life into you, and holds you up to the light.)_

❦

“What are you two doing here?”

Sakura and Sasuke look up in unison, their mutterings interrupted by Ino. The latter’s lips are twisted into something of a curious pout, and her eyes ping between the two, suspicious.

They straighten, and her eyes rove over them, drinking in the sight. It’s all very casual. Too casual. Bright, ocean eyes linger on them, the basket in her hands, and their faces. She’s great at delving into minds and yanking out the juicy parts, and not so bad at reading expressions. This goes beyond anything apparent on the surface. She can’t place the slightly windswept, ruffled look they share. It’s new. And why are they just _here_ at the market, like normal people, god forbid, like an average couple?

“It’s my day off, remember? Personal day.” Sakura asserts this plainly at the end.

“Quite personal,” she echoes, and a grin winds its way onto her face. Sakura flashes her a look of warning. “You actually look feminine today,” she teases, plucking at her best friend’s shirt.

Sasuke frowns openly, the most emotion Ino’s seen from him in a while. Her eyes widen and she reaches out for his face; he jerks back, leaning out of her grasp.

“What the shit happened to your face, Sasuke-kun?”

“I’m guessing it’s her doing,” Sai pipes up, joining their group. He also has a basket, filled with assorted watercolor paints and other tools. “No one punches like her.”

“Two black eyes?” Ino says, pulling back.

Sasuke raises his eyebrows at Sakura, _I told you this would happen_, who occupies herself with a nearby display, moving around assorted objects louder than necessary.

“Also, what’s with your face, ug-Sakura?” He’s been much better about the “nicknames” with Ino’s direction, as she’s repeatedly stressed that it will yield less broken bones and possibly keep him on Sasuke’s indifferent side, rather than his murderous one.

“What do you mean?” Ignores him, rummaging in a pile of trinkets she surely will not purchase.

He clicks his tongue, as if it’s obvious. “You’re glowing.”

Turning to Sasuke, he adds, “You are not.”

Sasuke wonders if they really need to keep Sai around. Or alive.

“It’s just so nice to have a day off!” Sakura smiles wide, but it’s a little too much, pushy and eager.

Sai is quiet for a moment, thinking. Then:

“Are you pregnant?”

For this, he receives two rough punches in the arm, both mild in comparison to their full capacity, but no less threatening. Overlapping are their high-pitched protests, and Sasuke’s single protestation of _fucking idiot_.

“You never, ever ask someone that,” Ino finishes, punctuating it with each jab of her finger.

Sasuke nudges Sakura, jerking his chin at something behind Ino and Sai; Sakura’s bright eyes track it for a moment before the something, or someone, vanishes out of sight.

Ino notices.

“What is _with_ you guys?” Puts her hands on her hips, eyes steely and determined, narrowing them as if summoning the truth from their bodies with sheer mental will. Then her eyes widen, mouth falling open a little as she alights on the unspoken reason. “Sakura, you’re on a date. You two are on a fucking date!”

Sakura opens her mouth to deny, but Sasuke nods firmly. “Yes.”

Her bright green eyes and stricken expression almost fracture the lie. Sai notices.

“You didn’t even tell me, what the hell, Sakura! Unforgiveable."

“Well, you have been using me to win bets.”

“Yes, well,” she waves that minor detail away, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “You’d better tell me every. Single. Detail. Or I’ll strangle you. Lovingly, of course.” Giggling, she wiggles her fingers at Sasuke; his face is blank in response. “Come on, Sai. Let’s leave them alone.”

Sai frowns, unconvinced, but allows himself to be dragged away. With a last, swift glance at Sasuke, he follows.

Sakura folds her arms. “More gossip fodder. Great.”

“Didn’t think you’d want her to know what we were really doing.”

“She’s going to tell the entire village, down to the last carrier pigeon.”

“Possibly better than telling her the truth.”

“You’re right, I guess reconnaissance would be hard to explain. What a fun first date, huh?”

“This was your idea.”

“I think I like you better quiet.”

“And you, loud.”

She coughs, hating herself for blushing. “Well! That’s . . . whatever, Sasuke-kun.”

Sasuke remembers Naruto’s quip about her poor, flustered comebacks, and leaves it in the air as a half-smile. He muses on the safety and efficacy of this, but also wants to make a bold statement, leave a message for the enemy, damn the idea of hiding. This place is home. If they’re as renowned as Sakura thinks, let them make a move in the daylight. Let them come.

She fingers trinkets and baubles here and there, making her methodical, disguised as aimless, way through the shops. Or perhaps she’s not; he’s not sure what exactly what’s buzzing in her head. If nothing else, it’s an odd situation, vying to be ignored by everyone she knows and still hoping to trip up the interloper.

As they reach a stall with an odd assortment of ingredients, she engages the shopkeeper about their origin, complete with a familiar and gentle touch on the arm of the older man for good measure. Sasuke leans just close enough to feign interest, nodding occasionally, which seems to delight the owner. He must ask something about the two, because Sakura laughs, a nervous chirp, lowering her face to hide a small smile.

_There._ He (or she?) is nondescript, average in all manners of height and appearance. Years of tangling with talented shinobi, even those obscuring their origins, gives him an idea, admittedly along the lines of instinct. Casual clothing, but human weapons never wholly blend in with civilians: The gait, the knowledge of lethality. While it doesn’t suffice for starting a fight, it’s enough for Sasuke to feel like he’s alighted on a target. It moves when they move, always maintaining the trained amount of distance, never circling or crowding. It has orders.

“We, ah, have to go,” he mutters, tapping the handle of Sakura’s basket. The shopkeeper’s expression changes, eyebrows raising into his white, wispy hair, presumably at the sight of his black eyes.

Seeming disoriented, she blinks several times, recovering. “Right! Yes, of course, oh thank you, sir—”

Their pace idles. They feel eyes.

Leaning into him, she asks through a smile, “Where?”

“A few meters behind, left, your blindspot.”

He watches her lips pull back, revealing teeth. Not unlike an angry animal. There’s anger seeping through her expression, temper barely concealed. Nudges her, pulling her attention. Nods to a café.

Before she agrees, he leans into her, steering her gently.

It’s midday, and a packed establishment. Enough to blend in with the regulars, the shoppers taking time for leisure, and other shinobi taking personal days in civilian garb. Still, they’re not quite as inconspicuous as they would prefer, and as Sakura places her purchases underneath the table, gesturing and ordering, catching Sasuke’s eyes, every tiny hair on her neck and pore in her body is attuned. Sounds warble in and out, expanding and contracting in her ears, volume sliding in pitch.

_Tap, tap_.

She brings her eyes up to his.

“You’re tense.”

A shrill giggle erupts at a nearby table, and some heads in the vicinity turn, the nosiness of strangers and the hope of drama. Sakura’s eyes darken a bit, the sparkle dulling as she fixes her gaze on the young nurse with the dark hair, the source of the sound. There’s an uncomfortable few seconds in which they hold one another’s eyes, and the nurse takes another bold second to stare directly at Sasuke, then her again. Sakura raises her chin, challenging.

Finally, the nurse relents, ducking her head and scooting closer to her friends. They all lean forward, having found something to gnaw on and pass on to others.

“I work with her,” Sakura says unnecessarily, stirring her drink. Sasuke watches the motion, not sure what she’s even selected. Picks up his own mug, needs something to do with his hands.

“No. She’s your subordinate.”

“Right,” she responds, plastering on another strained smile as she continues to stir.

Sasuke’s gaze is watching over her shoulder, sweeping the café from left to right. In the intervening silence, she lets her knee fall against his leg under the table, brushing hair behind her ear. Unease and unused to being touched so consistently and kindly. His dark eyes watch as her fingertips trail off the strands of her hair; the way her imitation smile softens into a real one.

“No fucking way.”

Sasuke’s teeth clench tight, hating the voice before his mind registers to whom it belongs. Kiba strides up to the table without pretense, with his toothy, sharp grin and wild hair, looking like he’s found a wonderful gift addressed to him.

“Is this happening? Am I in a dream?”

“Kiba-kun,” Hinata says, the politest warning to watch one’s tone. Smiling kindly, she beams at Sakura, refraining from drawing attention to the obvious. When the two new visitors turn to greet Sasuke, they both seem to double-take.

“Hah! Who did that to your face? I’d like to give them a handshake,” Kiba laughs.

“Ahh, long story.” Sakura waves her hand, and tries to wave the topic away. Sasuke broods in silence.

“I bet.”

Sasuke frowns, realizing too late that it likely makes his face look worse. Shifting his attention back to Sakura, he’s devising a way to shake them loose when he sees her expression – eyes fixed over his shoulder, hard-edged, lips parted like she’s about to speak. Anticipates her next moves, her feet shifting to stand, spine straightening, the tendons in her arms and wrists and fingers coiling, tightening, ready to spring. The purple diamond in her forehead flashes ominously, a signal.

This isn’t how it can happen, not here and now, with all these civilians. But now that she’s found the target, so close, a source of torment and pain, it all seems like an easy choice.

Sasuke slaps his hand over hers on the table, and it rings in the café space. Heads turn in interest. Kiba gives Sasuke a quizzical look, but Hinata follows Sakura’s stock-still gaze, then quickly away, long hair falling over her eyes.

The women stare at one another, words exchanged in the silence, and Sakura can see Hinata’s expression change, the clouding of her pale eyes, the winding of the veins that signal activation of the kekkai genkai.

“Oh, Sakura,” she says, sounding breathless, “We’re so sorry! We’re interrupting your date.”

Bewildered, with Sasuke’s hand still on hers, her eyes flicker to him, then back to Hinata. She forces out a laugh, lacing her fingers through Sasuke’s with a grip that might sunder and strangle his entire soul.

“Y-yes! We’re here . . . together.” Her tone is false and cheery, and her eyes stray again to search.

Kiba makes a disgusted face, grimacing. Hinata shifts her weight for a moment, back and forth, steeling herself to do something, then throws her arms around Sakura in a full embrace.

Out loud, she says, “I’m v-very happy for you!”

But flush against Sakura’s neck, she whispers in the quietest breath—

_I see him too._

Hinata straightens, skin flushed from the neck up. She turns her gaze on Sasuke and winces at the bruises. “Very happy for you as well, Sasuke-kun.”

Looking around, she pats his hand, two small taps, the hand still pinning Sakura’s to the table.

“Glad you could nail—I mean, nab—your prince charming over here.” Kiba’s voice is a lecherous drawl, but he and Sakura exchange a grin.

They start to leave, but not before Kiba leans into Sasuke’s personal space with a parting shot. “Be cool to her, okay?”

Sasuke’s not sure when Sakura started having all these protective friends, or if he’s even one iota better in their eyes since coming back. Or if he’s anywhere close to paying back his mistakes, but he resolves, as he looks into the eyes of someone who reminds him a little of Naruto, scrappy and running on his guts and sharp honesty, to try to be the person she deserves.

The tail is long gone, but he squeezes her fingers a little, a warning and reassurance he can’t give in public, in this place. The flashing anger and fear in her eyes gets him heated, murderous. He hopes his first assigned mission will be to rid the streets of enemies, of the factions in the shadows and traitors around corners. Irony, for him, bittersweet. Peel back the curtain on whatever keeps her up at night, and erase them from the universe.

If he has time, he’ll think of ways to get back at Sai.

❦

Four loud, grumbling Narutos meander up the street, each with a box balanced precariously in some fashion. One perched on a head, wobbling; another on the tips of his fingertips, swaying and pitching. He makes quite the sight as they shuffle and dance, intent on keeping control of the moving boxes and also staying in formation. A bead of sweat shines on his temple from underneath his shaggy hair as he decidedly, like most aspects of his life, makes a simple task more fun though more difficult than it needs to be.

“Could have asked for help,” one of them mutters.

“Hinata-chan did offer to help us.”  
  
The Naruto with a box on his head snorts in response. “I’m not going to let her carry my heavy stuff! That’s ridiculous.”

“We’re ninja, she can carry some boxes. Look at Sakura-chan—”

“She can also pick up a mountain, so, she’s a special example.”

“Hinata-chan seemed like she wanted to spend some time with us,” one of them says in a serious tone, nodding with his eyes closed, emulating some wise old sage and dispenser of wisdom. “I think we’re avoiding her a little.”

Another embarrassed, non-committal sound, a bluster. “N-No way! Ha ha, why would we be doing that?”

“Are we asking ourselves questions about our own decisions? I mean, shouldn’t we know that?”

“Maybe out loud, it’s easier to talk about it.”

“Hey,” the original grumbles, shrugging a shoulder to rebalance the box on his head, “You’re all getting annoying.”

“You mean, _I’m _getting annoying.”

“Yup, that’s what I said, isn’t it?”

A collective groan floats from the group of Narutos, and as they continue to bob and weave down the street, managing the circus of boxes to the best of their abilities. It’s not much farther to Sakura’s apartment; strong growls shudder in all four stomachs, signaling hunger. The one with a box on his head abruptly swivels and begins walking backward as they draw nearer to her building, announcing to the rest of them.

“I’m going to dig out the spare key; here, take this!”

They begin to protest as he bends at the waist with a grunt, putting his arms out to steady himself; he heaves the box off his head and into the panicking, waving limbs of one of his clones. As they struggle with juggling two of them, wobbling and whining, the original jogs ahead with a laugh and a blithe wave.

Naruto reaches her front step and squats down to look under the ceramic, coral frog. When he discovers there’s no key underneath, he frowns, puts it down, and lifts it again to make sure it’s what he’s seeing. Straightening, he looks up through his hair; a wavering chime tip-taps on his forehead, beckoning him to tell a secret. Glass pieces catching the late afternoon sun, flickering glimmers of bright light. Bringing his arms behind him, places his hands across the back of his head and sighs, dramatic, his eyes catch the frog’s, each eye a little off-kilter, staring in opposing directions. A thought floats through his brain, wondering about the different plants Sakura was attempting to cultivate, and if it was possible somehow that could translate into better cooking. Ending up again on hunger musings, his stomach lets out a grouch of discontent.

_Tap, tap._

“_Sa-_kura-_cha-_n,” he calls, punctuating each stress with a sing-song note. There’s no answer or even a single sound from the other side of the door. He raps his knuckles on the wood again, and waits.

A loud sound, a stomp or perhaps something bodily hitting the floor. Pitchy tones cascading up and down, several words in quick, staccato bursts. An angry rumbling, a shuddering, deep baritone, and the sounds of these talking over one another, then entwining.

One bright green eye fixes him with a stare, visible between the edge of the door and the frame. “Naruto!”

“Here to move in, as ordered,” he responds.

“Right, where are your belongings?” She’s keeping her body hidden behind the door, fingers wrapped around the edge of the frame, and maybe her eye wouldn’t look so dazzlingly bright if the contrast against her flushed red skin wasn’t so noticeable. Naruto narrows his eyes and tries to lean around her, but her head follows, holding his eyes to block his view. Now she stands in the open space of the doorway, hand on her hip.

_Ah, she’s so red. Kinda cute_. He grimaces as if she can hear him, because he knows if somehow she did, his bones would be grinded to dust, packed in an urn and tucked away on her shelf for safekeeping. Neither of his teammates would intervene, either.

The clones all walk up, still balancing all of his belongings in nonsensical ways with their limbs and heads. Sakura groans, eyes rolling. “Four Narutos on my doorstep? This has to be a nightmare.”

“Where’s Sasuke? Don’t fool me, I know he’s here too.”

“He’s busy.” The statement is so obviously a lie that he tries to lean around her again, grinning still, and slaps his hand on hers that’s resting on the door frame, straining for a peek.

“Hey! Don’t you—”

“I’m not trying to steal him! I have boxes to bring in.”

A hand clamps down over both of theirs, and Sasuke leans over Sakura’s shoulder through the doorway. Eyes dark, intense. Tilts his head a little, smirks. “Can’t carry those on your own?”

A dusting of red passes across Naruto’s face, and he wriggles his fingers out from underneath the vicegrip. “I’m way stronger than you! You haven’t even been training.”

“Hmm.”

“Can you guys get your hands off each other and help your favorite teammate instead?”

They let him into the house. The clones file in with their various boxes, assorted items protruding here and there from the slapdash packing job. Sasuke relieves them of a couple of the boxes, eyebrows raised. As Sakura shuts the front door, the three clones line up and give her a quick, cheeky grin with a salute before disappearing in a cloud of smoke.

“Is this all you need?”

“Well, some of my stuff was already here. Hey, hold up,” he admonishes Sasuke, who’s heading toward the staircase. He pauses on the first step and turns.

“We know which room is yours, idiot. Let’s go.”

Sakura watches them, waiting until they’re out of sight before letting out a shuddering, deep exhale she’s managed to hide for the entire interaction. Fanning herself with her hands, she plucks at her shirt to pull it away from her skin; cold air swipes at her stomach and chest, mingling with her sweat and leaving chill bumps in its wake.

_Close_, she mutters to herself.

Already they’re coming back down the stairs, and she catches Naruto’s jibing, setting the tone for what will surely become a typical day in her home. “I can practically smell it on you, bastard.”

Sasuke mutters something indistinct, a deep undertone, and Naruto twitches reflexively, shakes his head with gusto. His reaction is defensive, and Sakura has an idea of what it’s about. “She and I aren’t – we haven’t talked—oh, Sakura-chan, I’m ‘sposed to give you this.”

Naruto rummages in his deep pockets, trying each one before locating the letter. Pulling out a sealed scroll and handing it to her, there’s no recognition in her eyes, signaling an unexpected message. He resumes his verbal sparring with Sasuke as she steps away to open it.

A few quiet whispers sound from her lips, and she taps it twice. A slice appears in the red seal, letting the tightly-coiled parchment unfurl in her fingers. The message is brief, but her eyes pass over it, once, twice, again and again, and her eyes widen and heartbeat starts kicking hard and fast, as if the words are haunted, alive, breathing on the page.

“Ino,” she murmurs, putting a fingernail between her teeth. The dazzling color in her cheeks a few moments earlier, draining fast, dissipating like water through a sieve. Leaves her pale. Eyes darting here and there, still repeating her best friend’s name like an incantation, holding onto it as if it will bleed away. Sasuke glances at her, her anxiety palpable and reaching, seeping into the room.

And now her hand is on Sasuke’s chest, small fist curled and the crimped paper visible between her lithe fingers. His quiet grunt of surprise is lurching, belated. Confused. It’s enough to distract Naruto from his woes and his words trail off into nothingness.

“Burn this.”

It’s a testament to the expressiveness and naiveté her eyes can reveal; to these men that know her, her fear is barefaced and clear. Pressing her fist into his sternum, the tiny sounds of the paper succumbing under her knuckles, fabric weakening. “Please, burn this,” she repeats.

Sasuke sweeps his hand over hers. The paper is passed, and so is her fear. It’s transferred like a talisman, and no matter how delicate or harsh their touches are to one another, it’s communication in the cosmic sense.

“I’ll be back.”

“Sakura—”

She holds him with her gaze, honed in the edge of a knife. Eyes green in the way of jewels, hard edges with a heavy, ornate weight.

The slam of the front door settles on Naruto and Sasuke both, shaking them loose from the odd reverie left her in her wake. Sasuke crosses the room to toss the letter in the fireplace, and as he crouches to start a flame, Naruto breaks the silence.

“She’s been really worried. Working a lot, too. I keep trying to tell her I’ll always protect her, nothing will happen, but it doesn’t help.”

A small flicker, and the paper begins to darken, black and grey ashes spreading, the colors rotting into cinders.

“There’s something else. I know people think I’m dumb, but I’m not so stupid I don’t know when a friend is hurting.”

Sasuke straightens up, doesn’t speak. The crackling in the grate is the only sound.

“Did she tell you anything about it? Whatever it was?” Naruto’s voice is pleading, almost begging for help. It’s in this moment that Sasuke doesn’t hate him for his overbearing care, can almost appreciate that someone else can protect their person, the woman that’s somehow put up with them for so many years, perhaps to the detriment of a normal type of destiny. Still, a little tug of jealousy.

Shakes his head, brushes past him to lower himself into the couch. Elbows on his knees, the day’s events sinking in. It’s something he let her wiggle out of, speak around like a hole in her heart.

“Everyone saw you, you know.” He’s always filling the silence for his less loquacious teammate. “There’s so much gossip that I heard it before I even got here.”

Frowning, he winds up and punches Sasuke in the arm, hard. Knows he deserves it deep down, for his sullenness, for what he’s always lacking, failing to bring to his relationships. He takes another and another, though they don’t hurt. Naruto starts to laugh, and though his grin doesn’t quite hold in his tears, he hides it by passing his sleeve over his face.

“You really are a jerk!” He grabs him by the shirt, shakes him halfheartedly, like he’s considering hugging him fully or crushing him to pieces. It’s apt – they’re always something existing in between. Each of their braided bonds are tight and interlaced, minimal space in between, soft and tender spots that they try to move gracefully around in which to spare feelings. The kindness and consistency in which his loved ones give him physical contact is startling, beyond articulation. Kismet triumvirate.

He’ll spend a lifetime living up to the man they believe he is.

Finally, he parries Naruto’s fist and returns with one of his own, a hard jab to the blond’s gut. An _oof!_, and then his laughter reaches higher, louder. Humming around them in a haze, like old memories.

“By the way, your face looks terrible, you bastard.”


End file.
